Foxes in the Vineyard
by illuminatachime
Summary: A chance meeting leads the marble-eyed Natasha Romanoff and the paradoxical, stolen soldier Bucky Barnes into a whirlwind of murder, mystery, and crime across a bloodstained Soviet Russia. Comicverse movieverse. Rating will be changed to M.


The first time she saw him, it was in Ukraine in the dead of winter, and her fingers were cold and wet and numb from picking her gun up out of the snow. Wind blew cold particles of ice and clusters of snowflakes into her face, and she squinted against the bright white all around her.

She had infiltrated a hidden division of the KGB, singlehandedly taking down an army-load of agents that possessed licenses to kill. Her cheek was bruising from getting rammed against a wall as she fell with someone else down the stairs. The other agent had broken his neck on the way down, and she'd walked away with mere scratches.

Having left her coat behind for heightened mobility, she regretted not snatching one of the dead agents' coats on her way out, minutes before she blew the place up. At first she'd planned to use a homemade bomb, but they'd deactivated it and she'd been forced to break into their artillery unit and find a half dozen grenades and one giant package. Easy.

Wrapping her arms around herself, she trudged through feet upon feet of snow; Ukraine's mountains weren't kind. She was walking downhill, and ashes, like black, burnt snow, were falling around her. Keeping her gun off safety, she turned and scanned repeatedly for escapees, knowing that this division, being secret, possibly had a few lookouts nearby.

A far-off sound told her that her suspicions were correct. Ducking behind a nearby fir tree, she held her gun up, yanking the zipper of her suit as high as it would go up her neck. She edged around the side of the tree, and her eyes quickly locked on a lone agent, walking cautiously away from a house that had been embedded in the middle of a cluster of trees. It looked to be smaller than a cheap apartment.

He was wearing blue, his brown hair cropped short, but not so short that pieces of it didn't fall over his forehead in the wind. She wondered why he was wearing such a vibrant color; even she had neglected her usual black-on-black ensemble for a white version of itself, so she could blend into the snow more easily.

"Damn," she murmured. He must've been around thirty to fifty feet away, and she only had two bullets left. If this were a normal mission she'd be chastising herself, but she'd just massacred a few dozen Ukrainian agents. Explosives and bullets were bound to be scarce afterward.

The cinders of the destroyed division fell down around him, making the sight of him against the blindingly-white snow look grainy. He walked with his head down, as if he were deep in thought or simply watching where he was going. The area around his eyes was so dark that she suspected he either had a very prominent brow bone, a mask, or heavy eyeliner. She filed that bit of information away, knowing it'd be important later. Male, white, brown hair, dark eyes, maybe six feet tall. Muscular but lean build. Allegiance unknown.

To shoot or not to shoot, she pondered her options. Aiming her gun at him, she breathed out a huff of air. Suddenly, a rush of snow fell from a nearby tree, and the man's head snapped in her direction. All was still for about five seconds; he was too far away to tell if they'd made eye contact or not. She held her gun with both hands aimed directly at him, her face twisted into an expression of disgust. "Come on," she breathed, feeling her hands waver in the cold.

He pulled out his gun quick as the devil, aiming it almost precisely at her. Stepping closer a few paces, he tilted his head. After another couple seconds of stillness, he pulled the trigger, rounding off six shots without even flinching. She leaped behind the tree, feeling two bullets carve their way into the trunk. "Dammit," she hissed, still unsure if he had seen her. Maybe he'd suspected an animal and had planned to scare it away.

No, she told herself. An animal would've gotten one warning shot, two at most. She rounded the edge of the tree, firing bullet after bullet in his direction. Her red hair blew over her head, blocking her vision and halting her shooting for a split second, and he dove to the side, taking the chance to grab a magazine from his jacket and jam it into his gun. "Hagh!" he growled, scrambling into a crouch.

Two bullets cracked towards her: one missed by a few feet, and the other grazed her side. She scowled, taking cover behind another tree so she could reload and then stepping out again.

Bettering her range, she aimed at his gun and after a couple attempts, she shot the gun in his hand away. His fingers let it go reflexively, not wanting damage to his arm. She glided towards him, being careful of the snow. Keeping her gun and her eyes trained on him, she looked him over as she stood only ten feet away. There was a gash on his right cheek, and he had fallen back, his elbows propping him up as he glared at her.

His suit didn't have any insignias on it, so she decided he wasn't a lookout. The others had all had the same symbols sewn onto their shoulders.

Cocking her head to the side, she studied him before speaking in Ukrainian: "Who sent you?"

He replied, "Who sent you?"

She put a bullet in his left thigh. Then she aimed her gun at his head, not bothering to ask again. He convulsed on the ground, giving an agitated grunt, but not screaming. Taking a step closer, she watched expressionlessly as he grimaced, turned flat on his back.

"You're not of this agency," she said, tilting her head lazily towards the wreckage as if she were bored.

"You figure that out all by yourself?" he said in English. Spitting to the side, he said, "You clearly didn't learn the concept of having manners." Gesturing to his leg, he scowled up at her, and she took the opportunity to memorize his face.

He was clean-shaven, with electric blue eyes and a set pout. With a thickly muscled body that could only clarify that he was a grown man, she guessed that he was past his early twenties. She couldn't guess after that, however. He could be forty or twenty-seven for all she knew. But it didn't matter, now.

"You're right," she said, her voice low and cool. "I was only trained to gather information and kill. I'm prepared to kill you."

He stared up at her, blood staining the snow in their peripheral vision. "In any other situation, I'd be worried," he said, and she tensed, not sure if she should check around herself or keep her eyes on him. She hadn't heard anything nearby, but that didn't mean someone couldn't have snuck up on her while she was distracted. Was this man a decoy or something? No wonder he was acting so snarky. Her eyes narrowed, and he continued, "Do you want to know why I'm _not_ worried?" She didn't answer. "I'm not worried, because before I was trained to gather information and kill – just like you were – I went to public school. And one of the very first things they teach you in public school is _how to count._ I got a good grade in math – so that means I know you're out of bullets."

He smiled. _Shit,_ she thought her eyes widening. Pulling the trigger, she felt the uselessness of the empty _click_ before she heard it, and in an instant, he was kicking his right leg towards her, bracing himself on the ground as he swung at her calves, striking her and making her fall down. Falling to her left, she twirled her gun in her hand and tried to hit him over the head with it, but he blocked her with a steel grip from his left arm and chopped his right arm towards her neck.

She dodged the fatal blow by mere inches but was left coughing hoarsely; something that wasn't good in this weather. As if sensing distress, the winds picked up around them and blew a mist of icy snowflakes towards the two spies. She rolled onto her side, away from him, but he was already on his feet, balancing on his good leg, having pulled a Luger pistol out from the back of his belt.

Staring up at him, she scrambled away in a crablike manner, feeling for her knife in her belt. Scanning around for it, she saw that he'd already snatched it. _Must've been when he hit me,_ she thought bitterly. Watching him, she saw him tilt his head in the same eerie manner as he had before, when he'd first seen her.

And then he squeezed his finger. A bullet shot towards her and her eyes seemed to zero in on it, watching it fly towards her. Pain exploded in her right shoulder and she coughed a Russian curse, hand flying up to put pressure on the stinging; on the heavily-pumping blood. She felt herself go dizzy from the pain, and little metal balls rolled in and out of sight; something called seeing stars. "Hah," she gasped, trying to dig her other knife out of her boot as the man stomped towards her, one halting, limping step after another.

He looked down at her as her consciousness faded, a strange look in his eyes as he said, "I've heard about you, Black Widow."

* * *

The woman with the wavy red hair passed out beneath him, and he knelt beside her, cautiously avoiding putting too much pressure on his left leg. She hadn't had any qualms about shooting him, and he hadn't had any qualms about shooting _her._ The Black Widow. She was a lot smaller than he'd expected her to be; like celebrities, who seem so tall and mighty until you meet them face-to-face and are actually taller than some of them.

"But you are a celebrity," he murmured to himself. He was quite surprised that he'd managed to beat her. "Just like me." Removing his jacket as a gentleman would for a lady, he used it to put pressure on her shoulder. Fighting her had felt familiar; practiced. He felt uneasy about that, but not too much.

He knew she would be awake soon, so he had to move fast. He took no time staring at the massacre she'd committed, as black ash was still falling and staining their already-blood-stained snow.

Taking a moment to let go of his jacket against her shoulder, he felt around his belt and found the pair of special handcuffs that he liked to use: no chain to break, to lock to pick; just a solid bar of metal with two wrist-shaped holes in it. Turning her onto her side and locking her arms into the cuffs, he studied her for a long moment before lifting her with his left arm and holding his jacket against her wound with his other hand.

For some reason, he found the idea of juggling the famous Black Widow funny, but he didn't laugh – he never really laughed these days. His leg was hurting and he wanted to carry her down to the lookout station, someplace he'd overtaken days ago, right under the agency's noses. He smirked.

The walk was tedious but he got to the lookout station. It was cold and he didn't have much more than bed sheets, his jacket, and a thick blanket, so it would have to do. Laying the Black Widow on the very soldier-esque cot on one side of the small room and sitting in the lookout chair on the other side, he took off his gloves and snapped the fingers of his left hand, priming to pull the bullet out of his leg. He'd lost his real arm years ago, in an explosion that had taken away most of his memory. This arm was prosthetic; his favorite weapon. Well, besides his guns.

He stuck his finger into his leg, feeling the alien inside of it and clenching his teeth so as not to wake the unconscious killer across from him. Fishing the bullet out of his flesh, he flicked it to the side and it pinged on the ground. Letting out a groan of relief and pain, he looked over his shoulder at the military-issue first-aid kit sitting in the corner of the room. Brilliant, now he had to hop to go get it.

Standing and balancing on his right leg, he eyed the Black Widow again before testing his left leg – stepping felt as if he were trying to cross a trapeze, but it hurt the same as it had before, so he figured he could manage without using acrobatics.

The cut on his cheek had ceased bleeding a long time ago, but it still stung when he grimaced. He wondered if the kit came with a mirror; he'd need it to determine whether or not he required stitches there. When he lifted the kit, it wasn't heavy, but it was big. He hoped it would deliver.

Setting it down beside his chair once more, he took out the necessary supplies to bandage and disinfect himself – gauze, wrapping bandages, glue, a needle and dissolvable thread, et cetera. As he collected his items, his fingers grazed over a small, metal pole. Lifting his hand to see what it was – it was too long and narrow to be scissors – he sighed, irritated, when it turned out to be a giant pair of tweezers, most likely crafted for pulling bullets out of bodies, as he had just done with his fingers.

He'd been described as 'surprisingly resourceful' and 'above-average observant' before, but sometimes he felt like it wasn't that way at all. Making a mental note to take inventory next time he had supplies at his disposal, he pulled down his pants and stitched himself up, gritting his teeth so he wouldn't make much noise.

Once he'd patched himself up, he pulled his pants back up and pulled out his guns; he'd retrieved his first gun from the snow before dragging the Black Widow, and now he was going to clean them while he waited for her to wake up.

_I should probably kill her,_ he thought to himself. _But there's a chance I can get some information, with that bullet in her shoulder. I wonder if she's the type to fear for her life._

He doubted it, but set to work anyway, cleaning the first gun – a Colt .45 – and then reloading it with a new magazine, setting it to the side in case he needed to reach it. Then he took care of his Luger, unloading its round and disassembled it, using a cleaning rod and a cotton patch to soak the bore. Removing the patch holder and attaching the bore brush, he had run it along the length of the bore a few times when he heard the Black Widow stir.

Looking over his shoulder, he took a minute to make sure he'd belted her to the bed correctly – he couldn't have her wriggling out of her restraints and snapping his neck from behind, now, could he. Nodding approval of his work, he returned his focus to his gun. He'd been bound like that before – several years ago, now – so he knew the belts would hold. The belts were part of the resourcefulness – he'd taken them off of a gurney and fashioned them to his liking.

He had a headache, but he dismissed it; his leg hurt worse, anyway. He felt mortifyingly underprepared. There wasn't any morphine amongst the abundance of the first-aid kit, and he'd saved half of the pain meds that were stored inside for the Black Widow, if she decided to cooperate with him.

She had stirred only once, which meant she was probably conscious and testing her bindings. Standing up as abruptly as he could manage with his leg, he walked towards the sink and filled up one of the paper cups that were held in a dispenser, attached to the wall. Grabbing the orange pill bottle of pain meds, he strode towards the cot, addressing the Black Widow directly so she knew that _he_ knew she was faking sleep. "Can you sit up?"

Her eyes opened slowly and rolled towards him, her face looking both ill and disgusted. "I'm in pain and I've got a giant belt around my chest," she told him sarcastically.

"Right," he said. Careful not to turn his back on her and keeping her in his peripheral vision, he walked towards the bedside table – which he'd moved to the corner so she couldn't grab it and hit him with it – and set the cup and pills down. Then, he grabbed her good shoulder and slid his left arm under the mattress, pulling it up from underneath her and propping it against the wall, pushing her back and checking the belt. "Better?"

She smiled demurely. He snorted and gathered the cup and bottle once more. "Here, take these," he said quietly, opening the bottle and shaking two tablets out. Holding his hand next to her mouth, he raised an eyebrow at her when she didn't open up.

Her gaze was piercing, and she stared at him sardonically. "They're probably poisonous," she abbreviated. "Or cyanide."

The right corner of his mouth quirked up into an almost-half-smile. "If I wanted you dead, I'd have left you to die and taken these myself. Open," he commanded.

"You should've killed me," she said perceptively, eyes narrowing in a way that he was growing eerily used to. "Why didn't you?"

"You're not exactly in a position to be interrogating _me,"_ he replied.

"So you've kept me alive for interrogation," she figured. "I guessed as much."

"Then why bother asking?" He was growing irritated, fast. He'd been civil enough to save her the medication. "You either take these now or I will," he said tiredly.

Her eyes flicked to his leg, and a coy smile danced across her face before it returned to neutral. Opening her mouth, she stared him in the eye as he shoved the pills in her mouth, then followed with the cup of water. She swallowed the pills obediently, and he said, "Was that so hard?"

"You should've killed me," she said again, this time her voice was flat. "Looks like I bit the sour apple."

"I left the bullet in," he told her, gesturing to her shoulder.

"I hadn't noticed," she said, rolling her eyes. "What, are you gonna poke it if I don't answer your questions?"

"Maybe," he told her. "Who sent you to destroy that division of the KGB?"

"What if I sent myself?" she asked, answering his question with a question. If he weren't trained to do the same thing, he would've argued with her like an idiot. But no, he'd played this game.

Smirking, he stood up. "Three minutes without air, three days without water, three weeks without food."

"Three is a magical number when it comes to death," she sighed. "I'm assuming you won't smother me, so at least I have three days. At most? Three weeks."

"But, you have to consider that you're injured, with blood loss that may or may not resume, depending on your collaboration."

"One week," she said. "Unless you decide to move – if you move me, that will disprove your lack of care for me dying. If you move me, you'll at least give me water. Oh wait – you just did."

He shrugged, a practiced move, but right now it came naturally. "Who sent you?"

"I'm my own woman."

"So you did it for...what, liberation? Were you a member of the agency? Or was it revenge on them for something they did?" he puzzled, looking out the window. He didn't have much time to sit and beat around the bush with her; he did actually have to move. Cleanup or Ukrainian police forces would be at the doorstep within a couple hours, he was sure.

"None of those," she said. "Or all of them." Her foot twitched, but he didn't flinch. He knew she was testing him.

"None of them," he answered for himself. In all his time, he'd always found misleading answers to be tacked onto the endings of truthful ones; he hoped this was one of those cases. "You were working for someone."

"You're not half as clever as you make yourself out to be," she said. "You were sent there to kill someone, too. Who was it?"

"What, you want to trade murder stories over coffee?" he asked, stiffening. _You were sent to kill someone, too._ So she had been sent to kill a single person. "What made you bomb the entire plant instead of just executing your mark?"

She tilted her head to the side. "I spoke too soon. There were…difficulties." She made a mental note that he was American; he had an American accent, for starters, and it wasn't put on because he'd mentioned coffee. Anyone European would've gone with tea. Most likely. "It's hard to infiltrate an apartment building and not run into the gang who owns it, you know?"

"So you met his or her siblings, and it ended in a firefight," he elaborated.

The Black Widow nodded, and said, "I met the whole damn family. Even the great-uncles. I annihilated all of them, I see, since you're not a part of their organization."

"I'm not," he said, feeling bitter that she was getting just as many answers out of him as he was out of her. Not bothering to ask her who sent her again, he sighed. He really wanted to lie down and sleep, but he couldn't because she was dangerous, and because the Ukrainians would be here to defend their territory any minute. "I need to get out of here, and you do, too," he said, mulling over his options. He didn't want to cart her along with him, nor did he want to set her free. The only other option was to leave her here for the Ukrainians to find, alive or dead. He preferred to kill her, because she knew enough to get on his tail later.

For some reason, the thought of killing her felt unjust. Probably because she was bound and injured and being held captive in the middle of a foreign country. Yeah, that was it.

He hit her on the head with the butt of his Luger. She slumped against the wall. Donning his jacket even though it was covered in both of their blood, like the snow he hadn't even tried to cover outside, he tapped his palm against her cheek a couple times to make sure she wasn't faking unconsciousness again, and then undid the belt as quickly as he could. Rolling her body onto the floor, he secured it around her upper arms a bit tighter than necessary, then checked the handcuff underneath her, to make sure she hadn't gotten out of it while she was sitting on it. It was secure.

The second belt he kept around her knees, tightening it a notch. Then, he used the remainder of the wrapping bandages to tie her ankles together, just in case. If there was one thing he'd heard above all else, it was that the Black Widow was trickier than any other human being known to spies. He didn't want to test it.

He packed his bag, a single duffel, full of his weapons and a few things from the first-aid kit. He took out his extra shirt and put it over her head, not bothering to get her arms through the sleeves because they were bound. He rolled her up in the thick comforter like a pig in a blanket; throwing her over his left shoulder once more, he noticed how heavy the additions to her person were. He didn't enjoy carrying heavy things long distances, and her total weight plus his duffel bag and its contents would be about a hundred and fifty-five pound, so it wasn't that bad, but he was holding her with his good arm, which meant he had to support her with his bad leg. Tucking one of his guns into the front of his tight, black cargo pants and hiding it underneath his untucked shirt, he gave the room a once-over. Gross bloody bullet that he'd pulled out of his own leg like a fool? Tucked safely away inside one of his pockets. Paper cup? Buried in the snow about five feet away. Just in case.

Stepping out the door, he pivoted so she wouldn't get jammed in the doorway, and noticed the blood from earlier, still blatantly in the middle of the forest. He didn't have anything to hide it or melt the snow, and he didn't feel like covering it up by cutting down a tree and having it fall over the mess, so he simply walked on.

Winter air bit into him just as the Black Widow's bullet had, and her calm, ruthless eyes staring down at him, ready to kill him, flashed in his mind. _You should've killed me,_ she had said twice. He should've killed her, but there was some damn noble part of him – maybe from the days he'd spent as a soldier – that made him feel guilty for kicking such a powerful creature while she was down. It felt like he'd be giving her the coup de grace, as if she were about to become roadkill anyway and he was just shortening her suffering. There was some sort of respect for the world-renowned assassin – one that wouldn't emit a pity blow.

She would survive this bullet wound and this winter, he knew, and she'd probably try to kill him once she had. His morals were definitely different than hers, so it was safe to assume that she was the one who would strike another while they were down. She probably wouldn't think she owed him for choosing not to let her die.

The walk down the mountain proved difficult – the snow drift was sturdy, but in some places it gave underneath his heavy steps, and one of his legs would fall a foot closer to ground. He was tired and cold and his legs hurt from the added weight, but he had his car waiting in the town at the bottom of the mountain, and that was his motivation to soldier on.

Exhaustion set in. Not the kind of fatigue he was already experiencing, but the general languor of having to return to base, report, and then receive another assignment was so taxing. He didn't bother researching the people he killed in great detail anymore; just the basics – relations, schedule, security. Most of them were political figures that the Soviets wanted out of the way, and if they told him to jump, he asked how high.

It took about an hour and a half to get to the edge of the town; after, he searched for the street on which he'd parked his car. It was an inconspicuous charcoal-painted sedan, with four doors and a full tank of gas. He put the Black Widow in the back seat, strapping her into a seatbelt and getting in the front seat. Putting his duffel on the passenger's seat, he drove straight east; it was almost six o'clock and would be getting dark soon.

* * *

The second time she woke up, she had a headache, and she was strapped into the back of a moving vehicle. The belt and handcuffs, she imagined, were about as comfortable as a straightjacket. Her tongue felt thick in her mouth, and she found the other agent's eyes in his rearview mirror quickly. He had a lazy expression on his face, from what she could tell, so she gave him a withering look. Staring out the window, she tried to make sense of where they were. Country roads spilt past them for what seemed like miles, and she watched for signs – street signs, landmark signs, gas stations and pit-stop restaurant signs. He'd chosen an extremely _back_ road, apparently, because the only sign she saw told the name of the family who lived down the lane.

"Morning, princess," he said unenthusiastically, watching her through the mirror even though he should've been watching the road.

"It's late afternoon," she told him. "You can't fool me that easily."

She thought she saw a cheek rise in one of his soon-to-be-infamous half-smiles. Raising an eyebrow in response, she motivated him to say, "Looks like your rep's gone to your head."

"Why are you carting me around like an infant?" she asked plainly, ignoring the quip. Her voice was low and she thought she might be getting a cold. "I'm sensing you're indecisive about killing me."

"Right now, I'm trying to put as much distance between me and the Ukrainians," he said, then checked over his shoulder to make sure no one was following him, as if to prove his point. "I'd be delighted to dump you on the side of the road like an old cow, but I'm afraid that'd only raise suspicion."

"What's more suspicious than having a tied-up woman in your backseat?"

"That might be questionable, but I don't think anyone would call the police on that," he said, the innuendo clear. His voice dropped low as he said it, like he was sharing an inside joke between friends. "I'd get the police if I dumped a body."

"And if I were to scream and tell them what you are?" she asked playfully, mirroring his half-smirk.

Drawing his eyes from the road to look at her through the mirror once more, he raised a thick eyebrow and said, "Then you'd be turning yourself in just as much as you would me." She fell silent at that, and he took an exit into another city; planning, he said, "Poltava."

"Poltava?" she repeated. "Is that where we are." A nearby sign confirmed it, and she sighed quietly. "So you went east. Towards Russia. Or is this another assignment?"

"Why don't I just draw you a map of everywhere I'm going within the next week," he said with thick sarcasm. She saw him frown as he turned left. "We can make plans for lunch in France if both our schedules allow."

She chuckled once, then moved her shoulder. "I'm going to get an infection from this bullet," she grumbled, glaring at her shoulder as if it would make the pain stop and the metal pop out. "It hurts."

"Relax, you've only had it in you for four hours," he said. "Another two and it'll be out, if you play your cards right." He turned the car left again, albeit roughly, so she jerked to the side and hissed like a cat.

It was getting dark, and the man drove along a street that was at first crowded like a market, but then slowly became deserted, almost to the point of looking like a ghost town. She leaned her head against the window and locked eyes with a Ukrainian man outside. He was wearing a blue jean vest and a bandanna on his head, smoking a cigarette. Large and scarred, he waved his arm for the car to pull into his garage, and soon they were parked and the man was walking up towards the driver's window.

The other agent got out of the car and faked stretching his legs, speaking quickly in Ukrainian. _Sorry I'm late. I ran into some trouble._ He pointed a thumb in her direction, and she met the older man's dark eyes once more, as he exchanged keys with the driver.

Grabbing his duffel from the passenger seat, he glanced at her before ducking his head out of the vehicle and opening her door. Quickly, he took off her seatbelt and hoisted her over his left shoulder, nodding once to the other man, who got into the car.

She was carried into the house just as the garage went dark from the door closing; everything was sideways, but she studied the house. Painted white and chipping, the walls turned into plain cement; the floor was made up of cherry wood floorboards. There was a strange smell, like potted plants long dead.

He plopped her down on another bed, then set his duffel by her feet. She wriggled like a worm, but he didn't react. He pulled out a paper cup, a bottle of rubbing alcohol, gauze, and a pair of tweezers that were probably designed for…extracting bullets.

"Tell me about being your own woman," he said quietly, rubbing an alcohol-doused cotton ball all over the tweezers. "That must be an interesting political standpoint."

She shrugged her left shoulder, wincing slightly as he removed the gauze from her right and began dabbing more rubbing alcohol around. "Sometimes," she replied, trying to keep her voice neutral. "Other times it can be pretty fun. I'll get orders to kill a certain politician, and when I tell them about independence as a female, they either find it endearing or sexy. Either way, though, it gives me motive."

He smirked. "But you're with an organization."

"Yes," she said. "I don't mind a leash. Today I came of my own accord; they had nothing against it. But tomorrow I might've come with an assignment."

"Do you research them or do you just kill them?" he asked, positioning the tweezers inside the wound, then pushing until he felt them tap the bullet. She groaned, making a face, but braved it. She'd had a lot worse.

"I have to research them," she said. "I always have to know why they're going down."

He nodded absentmindedly, grabbing a fresh pad of gauze and sliding it over the bullet wound as he slid the actual bullet out. Her knees jerked a little, but that was it.

"Ah, I barely even read the names anymore," he said. "The hit list is always piled so high with these political figures who're enemies, I just don't bother sorting it out."

"You should," she chastised. "What if you killed someone who could bring _good_ to the world? Politics should make you angry, and if you're not angry, you're not paying attention."

He tilted his head to the side, staring into her eyes. "So that's the reason you did what you did. Not because you were sent to kill them, but because they disappointed you. It being personal is what makes you ruthless."

"That's an excellent insight," she commented. "You're absolutely right."

He poured some alcohol into the paper cup and dropped the bullet in it, then wet another cotton ball and wiped at the injury, causing her to flinch a little. "I'm going to have to stitch this up," he told her, and she nodded her acceptance.

It took only two minutes, but he expected that if she hadn't been bound from the toes up, she would've killed him right then and there. He was okay with that; it's what he would've done, had it been him in her place.

Feeding her two more pain pills after patching her up with a new bandage, he stood up and said, "Get some rest. I'm moving in the morning." He grabbed the cup with his bullet inside and cleaned up his mess, throwing away the bloody gauze and stuffing the utensils back into the duffel.

"You should have shot me down like a rabid dog by now," she said placidly, staring up at him with harsh, thoughtful eyes. "Why haven't you? I'm healing."

"I think plenty of lives were taken today," he told her, his voice short. He remembered diving to the side and behind a tree as the ground shook from the explosion. At least twenty agents had been inside the building.

She sniffed. "Well then, I guess I'll see you tomorrow." Her limbs were cramping from lack of use; even as he watched, she twitched and squirmed slightly.

He shut the door.

Whether she knew or didn't know that he would be leaving as soon as the dusk transformed into pure, pitch-black night, he wasn't sure. She wouldn't hear him leave, but she'd know he was gone the moment she woke up – that is, if she slept tonight.

Wondering idly how she'd escape her restraints (she was the Black Widow, there was always a way, and that's why he had to leave quickly), he set his bag by the door. He used the washroom, flushing her bullet down the toilet and washing the blood off of his hands before going to stand at the window in the front room. He leaned against the pane and stared out into the night, waiting for the sun to retract its fingers and turn the city over to the night.

Darkness crept up slowly and then all at once, casting the slums of Poltava into a gloomy shadow. There was no activity outside; just the calm wind blowing through the half-dead trees. The stars shone brightly, and a little fragment of memory came back to him: counting stars and pointing out constellations with someone whose face was masked by an empty space, a smudged thumb print or a bleach stain; blotched over the most important thing he needed to remember and the most dangerous thing he could forget. He couldn't afford to forget that face, because with it came nostalgia and a sense of security, and he knew it was from when he was young.

Grabbing up his bag, he checked over his shoulder before exiting the room and padding out the front door, quieter than a shadow. The night air was cool on his face, relaxing the cut from where the bullet had grazed him. He hadn't needed stitches after all, but it still stung every time he moved his mouth.

_That's Hydra,_ he remembered his faceless friend saying, pointing a thin finger up at a large constellation. _It's the biggest of the 88 constellations. If I remember correctly, it was named after a water serpent from Greek mythology…_

The half-developed image haunted him all through the night and straight on 'til morning, as he found another car, then drove into Kharkiv and towards Russia in silence. Dawn made the land dewy and foggy, and his eyelids drooped as he began to get drowsy. _What was his name,_ he thought repeatedly, his mind wildly searching for a hint, but he found none. He filed it away as just another shard, a piece of the life he half-remembered before waking up minus a limb.

Half-everything, he knew. Half-memory, half-life, half-Bucky. _Sometimes _that's_ not even true, _he mused as he pulled out an identification card, imprinted with the name _Jaime Buchanan._ It'd been among many that the KGB had handed him when he'd signed on to be an agent – no, _assassin._ Bucky Barnes was a name apparently not stealthy enough.

He handed it to the station manager at the border between Russia and Ukraine, and was passed with an overly-courteous wave. He stopped at a gas station and went over his memory again and again, trying to place the faceless face. He felt overly haggard, as if an army tank had bulldozed straight over him and left only his heavy eyelids and his messy hair.

"Did you find everything alright, sir?" asked the clerk behind the counter, his thick Russian accent coming out in the choppy English he spoke. His eyes were glazed over from a long night of standing in the same spot.

Bucky shrugged, wanting to get off of his feet and rest his leg because it was hurting, and said in perfect Russian, "The only thing worse than not finding something is not remembering what you were searching for so desperately in the first place."

The clerk's glassy eyes met Bucky's in an empty gaze, and it was clear that he found no meaning in Bucky's words. Bucky gave him a fake smile that looked more like a grimace and sauntered out the door, towards his car and towards the place he was asked to, but never quite could call _home._


End file.
